What Every Young Woman Needs to Know About Heart Disease (Your Weight Plays a Role!)

The cure for a broken heart varies (sometimes it's a few scoops of Ben & Jerry's ice cream!) -- but the formula for a healthy heart is one that's easy to understand.

Tomorrow is World Heart Day, and the The Heart Truth, a heart health awareness campaign for women developed by the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute (NHLBI), part of the National Institutes of Health (NIH), wants you to start taking better care of that life-giving organ TODAY. Because what you do right now can help keep you healthy and strong your whole life.

“Women are developing heart disease risk factors at younger ages that ever before,” cardiologist Nakela Cook, M.D., M.P.H., a medical officer with the NHLBI, tells HealthySELF. This is something that most young women don’t realize, she says.

Some scary stats: heart disease is the number ONE killer of women in the U.S. — more than all the cancers combined, according to Dr. Cook. Plus, while it’s more common for older women to have heart disease and heart attacks, when younger women do have attacks or heart disease, they can be more severe, she adds.

There’s more: About one in 23 women in the U.S. between the ages of 25 and 44 actually has heart disease. And, more than 60 percent of women between the ages of 20 and 39 have one or more risk factors for heart disease!

The good news? Many of these risk factors can be changed. “This can have a huge impact on rates of heart disease later in life,” says Dr. Cook.

The risk factors that Dr. Cook says you can control include:

-High blood pressure

-Having diabetes or insulin-resistance

-High cholesterol

-Smoking

-Being overweight or obese

-Being physically inactive

The last four, says Dr. Cook, are the ones that are most prevalent in young women today: Being physically inactive, being overweight, having high cholesterol (which, she explains, is usually a result of the first two problems) and smoking. These factors, says Dr. Cook, are most important for young women to focus on changing.

How? “First, acknowledge that prevention is critical,” says Dr. Cook. “It’s never too early to take action and reduce your risk of heart disease.”

Take care of yourself — and your heart — in these important ways, says Dr. Cook:

1. Find our your personal heart disease risk. What is your blood pressure, what’s your BMI and is it in a healthy range? Do you know your cholesterol levels? Have a cholesterol screening test to check for any family or genetic reasons you may have high cholesterol, so you can take steps to control it.

2. Maintain a healthy weight by eating right and staying physically active. At least 30 minutes of moderate intensity exercise a day is ideal, says Dr. Cook, “But most of all it’s important to just GET MOVING!” All the little things add up, she says — from taking the stairs instead of the elevator, holding walking meetings instead of slouching around a conference room, taking phone calls standing up and walking instead of driving when you can.

“Heart disease is the number one killer of women, but it’s preventable!” says Dr. Cook. “One woman can be a role model for a lot of people,” she adds — meaning you can
be your own healthy heart spokeswoman for yourself, your friends and family. Take that to heart!